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From: taylor@hplabsc.UUCP
Newsgroups: mod.comp-soc
Subject: Re: Computer detracting from effective communication?
Message-ID: <443@hplabsc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 11-Jul-86 14:34:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: hplabsc.443
Posted: Fri Jul 11 14:34:58 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 13-Jul-86 05:02:07 EDT
Reply-To: utzoo!henry
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
Lines: 73
Approved: taylor@hplabs
Reference: <396@hplabsc.UUCP>


This article is from utzoo!henry (Henry Spencer)
 and was received on Thu Jul 10 22:27:34 1986
 

> ...most commentators who take the approach that "technology is
> neutral, the problem is with lazy or incompetent people" miss the fact that 
> when you change the environment, however subtly, you change behavior and sub-
> sequently results...

A change in technology certainly changes the results, often in subtle ways,
but that does *not* imply that it is to blame for poor quality.  This is
the classic "after this, therefore because of this" fallacy.

> I am embroiled in this discussion frequently over lunch by the resident 
> software group who feel that "pleasant but quaint" mechanisms as 
> specifications, test plans, structured development, dry runs, paper testing,
> etc. are artifacts of a by-gone age...

These are probably the same people who would patch the binary rather than
recompile in the old days.  At least they (probably) don't do that any more.
To repeat the point:  technology is *neutral*.  People who will take the
easy-but-sloppy way out will do so regardless of technology; only the
details change.  When you are remembering the Good Old Days, remember that
there was no shortage of Bad Old Days.

> ... My personal perception over the last 15
> years is that the quality and timeliness of software has been dropping
> especially since timesharing programmer's terminals became de rigueur.

Are you sure you aren't confusing a greater volume of software, with a
greater spread of quality and timeliness, with an overall decline?  Look
at the good stuff too, not just the bad stuff that catches your eye.

> ... To pick on two examples, take Clarke and Anthony.  Compare Clarke 
> of the sixties (2001) and Clarke of the eighties (2010).  He proudly
> proclaims his use of Wordstar ... in the second book.  I fell asleep
> reading 2010.

Asking an author not to change in 20 years, especially when he wasn't
exactly young 20 years ago, is asking a bit much.  Heinlein's work
deteriorated badly long before he started using word processing.  And
some of us don't agree that 2010 was bad, by the way.

> ...  Piers Anthony 
> ... always been a high-volume writer pumping out four to eight 
> serial novels a year.  His hallmark has been high entertainment...
>  or stabs at philosophy ... Above all, he was entertaining. 
> ... he proudly announces the purchase of word processing which he 
> used on [a new] book.  The book reads as if it is a hacked together string
> of episodes and puns (the series was noted for its puns)...

If you're speaking of the Xanth books, the degeneration in them started
long before Anthony computerized.  This too is a well-known syndrome:
"once you've saved the world, what do you do for an encore?".  Being a
high-volume writer for many years is not an easy thing to do; are you
sure the word processor is really to blame?

> ... neither Clarke nor Anthony can be declared anything short of
> masters of their trade.  If the introduction of word processing has changed 
> their efforts, what is happening to us journeymen, novices, and *grade
> school children* who are having technology put on us...

You have not established that it is, in fact, the introduction of word
processing which has changed their efforts.  One could just as easily claim
that the introduction of word processing helped offset the inevitable
dropoff in quality due to age in one case and sheer fatigue in the other.

Tell me, Terry, have you run into *any* outstanding fiction of late?
Surely there has been something you've really liked.  And the odds are
pretty good that it was done on a computer.

				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry